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The Scottish Government is committed to expanding the universal provision of free school lunches to include all primary school children, during school term-time, by August 2022.

The option for all women aged 71 and over to self-refer for a breast screening appointment will resume once capacity in all screening centres returns to pre-Covid or close to pre-Covid levels. This is based on the recommendation of the Scottish Screening Committee, the National Screening Oversight and the Breast Screening Programme Board, all three of whom are keeping the situation under regular review. They are also working closely with Health Boards to increase appointments and meet this criteria as soon as possible.

As breast cancer is the most common cancer in women, it can occur in more than one family member by chance, and most cases of breast cancers are not hereditary. However, particular genes, known as BRCA1 and BRCA2, can increase the risk of developing breast cancer, and these can be passed on from parent to child. Arrangements have therefore been made to ensure that women aged 71 and over can continue to be screened for the duration of the self-referral pause if they have been identified as being at very high risk because they have BRCA1 or BRCA2 genes.

We also continue to emphasise that everyone should remain symptom aware and report any symptoms to their GP immediately for these to be investigated.

The Scottish Government only collects school pupil attendance and absence information every 2 years, so no data is available for 2017-18.

Information for 2018/19 shows that for term 3 (covering the period roughly April-June) the combined authorised and unauthorised absence rate was 7.6%.

In 2019-20, schools/hubs were only open to the children and young people of keyworkers, and those who were vulnerable, in the period April to June 2020.(due to the Covid pandemic). Therefore, most children and young people were not to attend school during this period. As such, at its highest, only around 1.7% of all pupils were attending these schools/hubs at any given time during this period.

For 2020-21, for the period in question (i.e. April to June 2021), the combined rate for pupils not in school due to Covid-19 related reasons and Non-Covid-19 related reasons was 10.4%. Note that this data has been produced on a slightly different basis to the biennial National Statistics publication. For example, some pupils who are currently counted as 'not being in school' may in fact be recorded as being in attendance (e.g. pupils who were self-isolating but were able to learn from home)when the Scottish Government publishes its usual National Statistics publication on School Attendance and Absence 2020/21 which is due later this year.

Care should be made if attempting to compare results across academic years due to varying ways in how this data was gathered over the most recent academic years, together with variation in the levels of quality assurance being undertaken on the data gathered.

The Scottish Government has worked closely with Glasgow City Council on operational plans for Fan Zone to ensure public safety. While clinical advice has cautioned against mandatory testing and checking on arrival, which may impact attendee flow and risk increased mixing, attendees are encouraged to test before and after the event, with test kits posted out to ticket holders.

Based on available data, the number of cases associated with the Fan Zone was particularly low.

Testing alone will not stop Covid transmission, this is why it is used as part of a package of measures to reduce risks. We will continue to encourage people to test before and after all future events and will consider whether this merits further exploration for future similar events.

This question relates to operational matters that are the responsibility of the Scottish Court and Tribunals Service (SCTS) corporate body. The question has been passed to the Chief Executive of the SCTS who will reply in writing within 20 days.

Live music performers should follow the performing arts guidance, available here . This was developed with a wide range of performing arts practitioners and looked ahead to outline details for the eventual resumption of live public performances. This guidance was last updated on 19 July. This update confirmed the move from 2 metre physical distancing to 1 metre in all indoor settings including in performing arts venues.

Separate guidance is available for live music performances which take place in hospitality settings. This reflects the different considerations that need to make in hospitality settings. The guidance for live entertainment in hospitality was updated on 16 July. The main purpose of the update was to indicate that live entertainment would be possible in general hospitality from 19 July.

With regards to live performances in events and stadia settings, the First Minister’s statement on 13 July confirmed maximum attendances as 2,000 in seated outdoor settings and 1,000 in standing outdoor settings, and indoors to 400. Organisers can apply to local authorities for higher attendance capacities.

To assist event organisers the Scottish Government has developed guidance for the sector, last update on 20 July: Coronavirus (COVID-19): events sector guidance - gov.scot (www.gov.scot)

The next review of restrictions will be in the week before 9 August when we hope to be able to move beyond Level 0 with baseline mitigations in place. We have consulted with the live performance sector widely on these mitigations to ensure we understand the impact they will have on businesses and their likely effectiveness.

This Scottish Government is committed to concluding the Local Governance Review within this parliament. During the first phase of the Review, the Scottish Government, COSLA and the community sector undertook a highly inclusive engagement process called Democracy Matters. People from diverse backgrounds overwhelmingly wanted to see bold changes to how power is shared. Further extensive engagement with communities - of place and interest - will be an important part of understanding how best to respond to people’s aspirations for genuine control over those decisions which affect them the most.

This Scottish Government is committed to concluding the Local Governance Review within this parliament.

I chair the Construction Leadership Forum (CLF) that meets monthly with trade union, construction industry and government representatives collaborating on driving progress on the Construction Recovery Plan, which contains a range of practical actions to support the sector. The trade union representative is a positive, and active, member of the group. The CLF and I am committed to supporting the sector as best I can.

We are focused on delivering the maximum support for businesses and the economy as possible. Since the start of the pandemic, businesses have directly benefitted from more than £3.7bn in support – more than a third of total COVID-19 funding – £2.8bn in grants and £965m in COVID-19 non-domestic rates reliefs.

The Scottish Government supports measures to ensure that individuals and businesses pay a fair amount of tax. However, IR35 and VAT are both areas of policy fully reserved to the UK Government.

The bowel, breast and cervical screening programmes were paused in March last year, and restarted last summer with the initial focus on higher-risk screening participants and those whose appointments were affected by the pause.

The bowel screening programme is currently sending home test kits at the same rate as before the pandemic, and no one is waiting for an invitation.

The breast screening programme is recovering, although infection control measures, including physical distancing and personal protective equipment, mean there are considerable capacity challenges. At this time, we do not have data on the number of people affected by the pause; however, we do know that slippage varies across health boards. The National Screening Oversight, the Scottish Screening Committee and the Breast Screening Programme Board continue to work with health boards to increase the number of breast screening appointments available.

Covid-19 also continues to present challenges in the cervical screening programme. However, prompts and reminders are being issued at pre-Covid rates. Estimates suggest that 5,786 invitations have not yet issued to people affected by the pause, but it should be stressed that this will be for a range of reasons, including participants being excluded from the programme after it restarted, or taking the opportunity to be screened at their GP ahead of their scheduled prompt to make an appointment.